Tattered 1st Edition of Communist Work Sells for $39,600

LONDON — A first edition of the Communist Manifesto with the front cover missing was auctioned off Wednesday for $39,600.

It was purchased at Sotheby’s auction house and by the Valmadonna Collection, a private British collection.

The price was about double what Sotheby’s had expected for the 8-by-5 1/2-inch book, the 19th Century work of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Sotheby’s said it is one of only 11 copies of the second issue of the first edition known to exist.

The German-language book was published in England in February, 1849, one year before Marx came to London. Many of the 1,000 copies were seized or destroyed when they reached Germany, and others probably were destroyed by the Nazis during World War II.

First edition copies of the Communist Manifesto are rare, but the document itself is not. Sotheby’s said it has been published in every European, Asian and African language, through 736 editions--exceeded only by the Holy Bible.